IAC

Post-Angi-spinoff IAC is now a focused holding company: the People Inc. digital/print publisher (40+ brands — PEOPLE, Investopedia, Allrecipes, Better Homes & Gardens), Care.com, Search/Ask Media, plus strategic public equity stakes in MGM Resorts and Turo. The investment case is value, not growth. The stock trades at $44.77 — a P/S of just 1.5 and, more tellingly, ~0.76x the $4.73B stockholders' equity ($59/share book). Management is voting with cash: $315M of buybacks in FY2025, including December repurchases at $38.26, shrinking the share count 3.7%. Below-book pricing plus the unmodeled MGM/Turo holdings give the position real downside support, which is why this is a 'hold' rather than a 'sell.'

The other side is genuinely weak operations. Revenue has declined every year since the 2022 peak — $5.24B → $2.92B → $2.62B → $2.39B (-8.7% in FY2025) — and FY2025 swung to a -$97.4M operating loss (margin -4.1%, down 239.7%) and a -$104M net loss (EPS -$1.30). Operating cash flow stayed positive at $64M but fell 66.7%, and the accumulated deficit widened to -$643M. The MD&A's own description of People Inc. exposes the structural threat: digital revenue is 'advertising' and 'performance marketing' (affiliate commerce that depends on 'branded content referring consumers to commerce partner websites') — exactly the search-referral traffic most exposed to AI answer engines. The partial offset, also disclosed, is content licensing 'utilization in large-language models and other AI related activities' (Apple News+ and similar) — a small but growing hedge.